What did you do at the range today?

[The Harbor Master]

Tried to zero .223 trainer today, with new 3-9 SWFA. Started off great, as a new .mil adopter sighting in was WAY easier. Shot 2 rounds at 50yds after boresighting, then used the reticle to measure. Made the adjustment, and was where I needed to be. (55gr PMC Bronze). Everything was shot off bags, prone. My goal was to get this dialed in and move into positional practice all off-season.





No math, no stupid "how many MOA is 8 inches at 50yds?" mental gymnastics. Measure, click, shoot. As expected, the 55gr was all over the place, so instead of chasing it around trying to fine tune a zero, I moved on. AAC 77gr OTM shot like garbage (2.5"-4" groups) but that's nothing new... before this rifle was cut/threaded it did the same. And similar to before the cut, 73gr ELD-M seems to shoot at 1"-1.25" which is good enough for me. Unfortunately, I accidentally grabbed the wrong range bag and only had 7rds of it. The 6th and 7th rd did start to trend up and left, but not terribly... enough to make me wonder what was going on.

I then tried some 75gr Horandy BLACK (HPBT) and had 3rds in a "not great but acceptable" group. Planning to shoot at least 10rds to get cone of fire, the next 3 grouped roughly the same, but high and left. What the hell!? It's 29⁰ out, so I didn't think I'd have mirage issues, but maybe?



To rule it out, I let the suppressor cool completely until cold to the touch. Fired another 3 and they came right back down to POA.



Let the suppressor fully cool again and shot the last 3 hoping to confirm that mirage was the problem...



Well damn; I guess mirage is for real, even in sub-freezing temps. I'll measure this group when I get home but very happy with the BLACK. I've read some posts about hunting success with them in the .223 thread, and while it seems to do okay, I'll likely train with it due to price and hunt with the ELD-M... at least until I get my hands on some 77gr TMK. If those shoot anywhere near the BLACK or ELDm, they'll get the nod for hunting.

I may give the AAC OTM another fair shot, as the poor groupings mimicked the BLACK's shift with mirage. Heck even the PMC Bronze might be better than I thought, chasing it around may have been mirage as well.

 

[justinspicher]

Yesterday I did pistol work.
1rd x 10 from compressed draw at 5, 7, 10yds.
1rd x 10 from concealed draw at 5,7, 10yds.

10rds of doubles from compressed draw at 5,7,10yds.

10yd sprint repeats x 2rds.

 

[justinspicher]

Today I went out with a buddy and we did position work at 200, 315, and 400 yards. Steel was a 12” square. He shot of his pack, I shot off my tripod. We did all shots sitting. Finished with prone work at 200yds shooting 4”-12” plates, working on a follow up shot on a swinging plate.

 

[Chris in TN]

Today I went out with a buddy and we did position work at 200, 315, and 400 yards. Steel was a 12” square. He shot of his pack, I shot off my tripod. We did all shots sitting. Finished with prone work at 200yds shooting 4”-12” plates, working on a follow up shot on a swinging plate.

I have a hanging rubber ball I shoot wirh .22lr at 25 to 70 yards or so. It’s 3” and if you hit it centered it swings almost straight back, and follow-ups are easy. Hit the sides and it swings side to side and it’s tough. Fun though.

 

[waspocrew]

Wind was howling today, so figured the range would be empty. Ran up there and fireformed 45 pieces of 270 Win brass to 6.5 Sherman.

Found some new Federal Gold Medal 6 ARC ammo on sale at Scheels, so will likely head back tomorrow to try it out in the Tikka 6 ARC.

 

[ThunderJack49]

Did some hiking and shooting this weekend.
Ruger American in 6 creedmoor and a tikka in 223.
Shooting rocks of various sizes from 300-600 yards.
The day got a little off track when the black dog got caught in a wolf trap. We got him released relatively quickly and he shook it off pretty quickly.
Interestingly we realized a creek was possibly creating a down draft we couldn’t notice and pulling our shots farther than we had anticipated at 600. Not 100% that was the cause but it seemed possible.
Constantly being humbled on this journey and realizing what it takes to be a better shooter. Also, brushed up on my knowledge of how traps work this morning.

 

[elsb0048]

Took advantage of a juneuary warmup that melted out a shooting spot I'd wanted to check out.

Got out to try to get hits on steel & paper at ~500 and see how well I trued my velocity the other week at 370.

Shot a brief 5 shot group at 110 to confirm my zero was still good.

Had 1 miss on the steel plate at 500 in part because I had my elevation off by ~2200 ft and in larger part because I suck.

Also intended to measure POI difference between a couple factory loads my gun likes. Got a little muddled up by a loose suppressor again partway through. Need to get in the habit of checking that more frequently.

 

[RockinU]

1760…

 

[justinspicher]

I did a follow up shot challenge tonight. I shot from the prone, off a bipod, using my small pack as a rear bag. My goal was two shots within 10 seconds. I started at 200yds and shot at a hanging 10” gong. I also tried it at 300yds. It was humbling.
I started it out with my magnification at 8x, going down when I went 2/2. I wanted to see how far I could get with 20 rounds.
Here’s how I did:
200yds follow up
8x 2/2
4x 2/2
2x 2/2
300yds follow up
8x 2/4
8x 2/4
8x 2/4
8x 2/2

 

[Chris in TN]

I’d like to shoot on this nice snowy day but the cows are paying me back for feeding them ‘beef pellets’ that taste like cardboard:

 

[diverc18]

Ended up testing different ammo for my ar. Doesn’t seem to be very picky. All ten shot groups hovering around 1.5 inches from a below average shooter. 69 smk velocity was 2555, 73 eldms were 2618, and 77 smk was 2467 out of an 18 inch barrel. Gonna get my hands on some 77 tmk soon. In the mean time, I will hopefully put some 73 eldms into some axis deer.

 

[Chris in TN]

So over the last week or so I have finished off all the ammo I loaded for the kids' 6.5cm last fall. I'm using RL16 powder which is supposed to, among other things, be very consistent from lot to lot.

I opened a new pound of it last night and, given that my existing load was a full grain below where I'd found 'max' to be with this rifle, I gambled on this 'consistent from lot to lot' powder being the same and went straight to the same load I'd been shooting.

Over a dozen shots or more, the previous lot, with 1x fired brass and 42.0 grains/147ELDM had averaged 2609'.

Ten shots from the new bottle today averaged 2659' with a SD of 18.x. That's a bit disappointing. I don't mind the SD, but seeing a full 50' speed change surprised me.

I did, however, finally fire an actual 10-shot group:


l/r was dead on. Elevation is 1 click low to match my existing 0-500 data. Two clicks if the velocity had matched the previous bottle of powder. I'll add one click and call it close enough. I'll use the rest of this pound of powder and might switch to something else (H4350 or VVN550/555/560?) later. Alliant has priced themselves out of my market.

I recently rebuilt my 6.8spc AR with a new side charging upper. I had rough zeroed it the other day and shot a 10-shot group today to zero off of. Now I have to load more ammo to confirm it. Haven't had time to load much lately.

I *think* this group might have been a hair larger than indicated. I suspect that I skewed the photo just a hair and didn't notice until I was back home and I don't want to tromp back out in the snow to take another. Either way - this is a pretty typical group for this rifle. It's done better (even very slightly under MOA for ten shots) with Nosler Accubonds but I'd rather hunt with the Hornady v-max at 6.8speeds.

@justinspicher



ETA: the 6.8 is Starline brass but I shot some of the same load with S&B brass the other day and they fell within the same range as the ten I shot today (2655' average, SD of 11). I'm going to experiment and see if I can use both brands of brass interchangeably. I think I can.

 

[waspocrew]

I picked up a new thermal last week and quickly mounted and sighted it in (or so I thought). I had used a thermal target (basically a sticky hand warmer). Initially, it appeared great, but as time went on, the target created "thermal bloom" in the scope and it was difficult to tell an actual zero.

I missed a coyote last night, so I figured the zero was likely off. Turns out I was right. I was aiming for the left bottom corner. Made the correction and fired another 3 on the bottom center target. Ranged the small gopher sized flapper target at 300 and went 3 for 3, so I shouldn't have any more excuses with a miss

 

[BishBeCool]

100 yard work today.

Tikka .243, 20” 1/8
UM Rings, SWFA 3-9
Prone off bipod


6.5 CM Zermatt Origin action, 22” proof pre fit, bravo stock,
Prone off bipod



Same 6.5 different ammo



The Tikka only has 80 down the barrel as of the posted 10 shot group. Have not loaded for it yet, all factory. Not super thrilled with the groups but hoping it settles in and I can find something when I start working something up.

The 6.5CM is really liking 143 ELDX Hornady precision hunter. Rifle has about 180 down the barrel I believe as of today. (Have to check)

The factory 147’s are not terrible but obviously not printing same groups as the 143’s. Shot 10 of the 147’s at 100, turned to 300 yard 6” plate. Held 1 mil went 5 for 5 impacts to finish out a box of ammo.

 

[justinspicher]

Took a couple of buddies to the range and we worked on shooter/spotter dialogue.

 

[elsb0048]

2950 ft, 40F, calm to apparently a 5mph left-to-right wind

Began by completing comparing POI change between a few factory loads on the .270. Finally managed to get it done without the suppressor coming loose.
Pleased to note that I should be able to get away without a scope adjustment for positional practice with the cheap ammo or when I occasionally want to hunt with copper to 200-300yds instead of the ELD-X



Then took the .270 out to 685.
Took 5 rds or so to walk it in, as I'm totally learning on the shot spotting.
Had to drop .1mil (maybe still not quite got the velocity dialed in?) and hold .5 for wind (equates to ~4-6mph wind according to 4dof)
I'm a 100% beginner with the wind so this was a great learning step for me.




Did a zero check on the .243 for kicks and to see if anything moved when my nephews dropped it hunting deer this fall.
finished up the .243 by checking the drops @ 440 yds.


Then some positional shooting with the .270.
I really struggled trying out shooting off the tripod. Didn't jive at all and need to do some more messing around at home.
went 4 for 4 at 300 off of quick stix + a pack and got a first round hit at 440 to close out the day on a pleasant note.

 

[JD Jones]

28 degrees here in Texas but I finally got my trainer all put together recently so I was eager to get some trigger time. I'll preface that This is my first tikka. I've been well aware that they had slick actions. That they typically shot. Yada yada since probably 2007 when I first considered one. I always thought they were kinda ugly and just wasn't sold. Enter Rokslide. This winter I caved and bought one. Wanted a trainer so I got a t3x in 223 with a 20" 1-8 twist. I bought a manners to be as close to my custom as possible and here we are.



I just shot 60 rounds today due to time constraints. I bore sighted. Sent 1. Adjusted to impact shot 39 rounds and collected ammo data and velocities. Avg was 3107 fps. Ext spread 121. Std Dev 31. Using ADI 55gr Sierra blitzkings.

I then proceeded to shoot a 20 shot group (#20 is in there somewhere). 3116 fps. Ext Sprd 116. Std dev 27



This string was shot only removing position to reload the last 10.

So I'm now looking at buying another needless to say since I think I NEED another 6.5 PRC.

 

[justinspicher]

I just worked on the range. I moved some targets, added a few and painted all of them. Me and the boys will shoot tomorrow.

 

[Chris in TN]

Hit the range. Mainly played with pistols and the new chronograph

View attachment 1014542

Really thinking I'm goona like this 223

View attachment 1014543View attachment 1014544

What magazine is that??????

 

[justinspicher]

Just back from the range. We did continued work shoot/spotter dialogue. Shot in various positions using tripods and packs out to 700yds.